


The Message In Our Bruises

by DinosaurTheology



Category: Star vs. The Forces Of Evil
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Best Friends, Drama & Romance, F/M, Friendship, Friendship/Love, Love, Romance, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Soulmates, Teen Angst, Teen Romance, True Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-26
Updated: 2017-12-26
Packaged: 2019-02-07 05:24:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,171
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12834234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DinosaurTheology/pseuds/DinosaurTheology
Summary: Marco notices a pattern of strange bruises appearing on his body and a message written on his skin.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! So, the Star Bomb was pretty great. I've got lots to work with and I'm so happy to have such a wonderful show and fandom to write in.

It isn't long until dawn when Marco Diaz feels a sharp pain in his stomach. It burns, freezes, creeps across his skin. He starts awake with a jerk and a cry, cannot prevent his limbs from flailing in the darkness.

An elbow lands against the cheek of the girl laying beside him. “Dude,” Kelly says. “You're killing me, here. Tad never freaking Mewni Thai'd me in the face while we were sleeping.”

“That's cause Tad had tiny little vestigial arms and usually slept in your hair,” Marco says. Alongside the burning on his stomach grabbing aches and a queer heaviness are visited on his arms, legs, neck and shoulders. “And it's not happy times over here, either. I think I'm kinda dying.”

Her annoyance immediately drains away and is replaced by concern. “Really? I thought you were just having, like, a nightmare or something.” She taps the magical light on the nightstand by the bed they share. It offers little illumination but enough to see the purpling bruises spread against his tawny skin. 

Kelly's green eyes go wide. “Dude. I'm just gonna say, for the record, that I did not put those there. I mean, I don't even play that rough, right?”

“No, you're fine.” He tries to offer a smile, grimaces instead.

“Cause, like, Tad was really small and if I ever did enough to do that I'd have, like, squished him. We'd have never broken up cause he'd have been dead.”

He lays a firm, gentle hand on her shoulder. “It's okay, Kelly. It really is.”

“You're saying that now but when you're 'star witness Marco Diaz, the abused boy-toy' at my domestic violence trial, well, bud... let's just say that Queen Moon doesn't take this kinda shit lying down!”

“Seriously, Kelly, if I'm the star witness then I'll be able to say you didn't do it, right?”

She narrows her mossy eyes. “I guess that makes a certain kind of sense...”

“Then if the star witness is a witness on your behalf then, well, doesn't it make sense that you won't be found guilty?”

“Well,” she says, “well, I guess so... but if I get my head cut off and very possibly my hair messed up then I'm gunning for you, mister-mister.” She frowns. “We still need to find out what the hairy heck is going on with you.”

“Yeah,” he says, and grits his teeth as another bruise appears. “This started out old and isn't gonna get any younger.”

She's about to say something else, something really caring that an actual friend (maybe possibly at some point girlfriend?) and not just an occasional smooch buddy would say, but before she can squeeze the words out of her mouth he clasps his stomach and, face contorted, cries out in pain like he had before. “Oh, oh, oh jeez... it's my stomach. It's doing that... thing, again.”

Before he can twist away from her Kelly pins him with surprisingly strong arms and jerks the hem of his plain white t-shirt up away from his belly. Her eyes grow wide and she gasps. “Marco, uh...”

“Yeah?” Beads of sweat stand out on his forehead.

“Is there something you kinda need to tell me? Like, in the realm of self-harm?”

“What?”

“Look.” She grabs the mirror from her nightstand and angles it so that he can see his torso. Written across his skin creeping words of blood are the words: HELP ME, MARCO. HELP ME. -S. B. “Cause I can understand if this is, like, angst over Star and Tom hooking back up, or whatever. Or maybe it's some kinda weird sex game you two tried out? I know you carried a bunch of chains up to her room one night. Whatever, dude. It's all most chill.”

“No,” he says suddenly calm, forcing himself to be calm. “No. It's not self-harm or a weird sex game or... whatever you thought it was. It's Star. She's trying to send me a message.”

“Yeah, in the most ass way possible.”

He's already on his feet, already pulled the hoodie over his t-shirt, already started towards the door. “I've got to go to her, got to see what's happening.”

“So, uh, Marco...” She hovered right over his shoulder in a way of which she did not feel especially proud. “So, uh... you're a really cool guy, right? You do way more with what corn gave you than you ought to be able to...”

“Thanks, I think?”

“So, yeah, the main thing being, the point being, uh--”

“If you've got something to say, Kelly, go on and spit it out. I really need to get going. The bruises weren't great but that message on my stomach? That looked really bad.”

“That's the point,” she says, and clings to his arm. She really, really hates doing that but, well, what are you going to do when it's already done? “Star is a wand toting, butt kicking Princess of Mewni and you are, no offense, a super-fun smooch buddy that does the sword-hand dance. I'm not sure what you're gonna do exactly to whatever is doing this to her but, well...”

“I'm her squire, Kelly,” he says, “and what's more I'm her friend. We faced off against Toffee together and we're gonna face this together, too. I've got to go.”

“All right,” she says, “all right. Just give me a minute, okay?”

“A minute.” He checks his phone and notes that Star's last check-in was the Underworld. So he's going to hell for her... again. “Why?”

She takes the minute to pull her shirt, pants and shoes on and sling the two handed great-sword she carries into its sling across her back. “Cause I'm coming with you, dork.” She smiles. “Can't let a smooch buddy as good as you just go off and get himself killed, can I?”

He smiles back at her. “I guess not, huh? Let's go.”


	2. Chapter 2

All seems well in the Underworld. As well as could be expected, under the circumstances. Lakes of fire and the stink of brimstone don't make for a super touristy destination. Marco, in general, didn't care for the place. Tom is one of his best friends, sure (especially after they'd gotten over the whole constantly trying to kill each other thing), but it isn't like this was his number one choice for a place to hang out with him. The Lucitor's palace is okay in a brooding, late nineties Marilyn Manson kinda way but, to be truthful, the constant moaning and flickering of the damned really grates on the nerves and he'd rather have had him visit the Butterflies' castle. Or Kelly's apartment. Or really anywhere that wasn't the Ponyhead Kingdom because, in its own way, that was worse than the Underworld. A hell for hell, if you would.

They meet Star in the foyer of the Lucitor manse. She sports bruises matching Marco's including another on her cheek, across the heart blush, and a shiner that will blacken her eye for at least a week or two. When she saw him she flings herself into his arms and holds him tight. He returns the embrace for a long moment, then pushes her to arms length. “Star,” he says. “What the heck happened, here?”

“Well,” she says, “well, I guess things got kind of a little crazy, a little.” She offers a lopsided grin that's almost grotesque on her battered face.

Marco glowers. “You and Tom weren't fighting or anything, were you?”

“What?” She scowls with a little bit of her spirit fighting back from the shadows. “No. I'm not some victim, Marco. I'm Star Butterfly, Princess of Mewni and Slayer of the Immortal Monster. I don't need your Earth paladin Detective Olivia Benson to come and rescue me from my big, bad boyfriend.”

“Okay,” he says, “okay. You've made your point. What did happen, then?”

Kelly, who has up until this point remained quiet, nods sagely and says, “I bet it was some weird sex game that got out of hand.” She winks. “I've seen those chains, Star. Go on with your bad self.”

Star rolls her eyes and sighs. “For the love of corn, Kelly, it was not a weird sex game. You always think everything's a weird sex game! It's never a weird sex game!”

She shrugs. “Life would be a whole lot more interesting if it was, at least just once or twice.”

She giggles. “Maybe. But I think adding a weird sex game on top of this might have killed us all.”

“Which brings me back to my original question,” Marco says. “What the heck happened here?”

“You know how people say they've got demons, right?”

“Yeah, metaphorical ones.”

“Well,” she says, “Tom's aren't metaphorical. And one broke loose. We were just sorta sitting on his bed, smooching it up a little, letting things get...” She hesitates a moment and then goes on. “Well, it's possible we were letting things get a teensy little bit steamier than we should have, but all in good fun. But apparently it was too much for the demon representing his libido and... whoosh.”

“Whoosh?”

She makes a gesture with her hands like a bird in flight. “Yuppers, whoosh.” She smiles again. “It was sort of a cute little fella, really, til it started tearing around his room and smashing everything in sight.”

“So,” Kelly says, “this, uh... this cute lil fella... does he happen to be about three feet tall and have horns, no eyes and way, way too many teeth for something twice his size?”

“Er, that would be an oddly specific and correct question if he wasn't lurking behind me, wouldn't it?” Star asks.

“Pretty much,” she says. “And he is totally standing right there.”

“Gonna try a sneak attack?” Star squeals a little in glee. “So. Cute.”

Kelly nods in approval. “So his libido wants you even when it's separated from his body. Kinda hot, dude.”

“I know, right?” Star says. “I mean, I don't even.”

Marco squints and squirms. “Um, would you two mind very much if we did something about that guy? He's slavering and panting and sorta making me...” He grimaces. “Very, very uncomfortable.”

“All right,” Star says, “all right. Don't get your hoodie in a knot.” She spins and trains her wand on the small demon. “Cold shower wintergreen blast!”

A brilliant green lance of energy stuns the demon. It rocks back on its heels—or spurs, more accurately—and shrieks. Marco snaps a few quick kicks into its ribs, or at least where its ribs should be, and Kelly strikes it a punishing blow on the head with the flat of her sword. It's no great trial, afterwards, for Star to entrap it in a golden, glowing globe about the size of her palm. She smiles and, again, Marco is struck by the contrast between her bruises and beauty. “Kinda cool, isn't it? I have literally got my boyfriend's sex drive within my grasp.”

Kelly snickers. “That's what she said.”

Star turns to Marco. “So, uh... sorry about all the bruises and stuff.”

“Yeah,” he says, “about that... what the heck happened? And what's this?” He pulls up his shirt to reveal the message carved into his flesh.

She goggles at it, blue eyes wide. “That's, uh... that's not cool, dude. Self-harm is not your friend!”

“It's not self-harm, Star,” he says, “no more than the bruises. I thought you might have been trying to send a message, or something.”

“And I carved it into your tummykins?” Star says. “Ew. No.”

“Well,” Kelly says, “did you, like, at any point really, really wish your squire was here to help you?”

“Well duh,” Star says. “He's my squire. Helping me is what he does.”

“Makes a little sense, then,” she says. “Magic A is magic A.”

“Do the whoozy, now?”

“It's another way of saying, 'as above, so below.'”

“Hujimawha?”

“It's kind of hard to explain... like, when you have a connection with someone—a really realer than real one—you can kind of... feel stuff, or see stuff. It happened with me and Tad, sometimes, but he, like, literally lived in my head.” She shakes out her long locks. “I dunno, man, you're gonna need someone with a better grasp on sorcery than me to explain it. Sucks that Glossaryk is, you know... glopgor.”

“Totally,” Star says. “Glopgor. But I know someone who knows almost as much about magic as him.”

Marco winces. “Star, if you mean your mom then I really don't think that's she's the person to bring in on this. I mean, she's super awesome in battle and stuff but... she's not all that great at, you know, personal stuff.”

“I didn't mean her, Marco,” Star says. “We're going to the Rose Tower to talk to Eclipsa.”


	3. Chapter 3

High tea in the Rose Tower proves, as always, a civilizing experience. Eclipsa raises a translucent white porcelain teacup wound with maroon and dark green roses to her lips with gloved fingers and takes a sip of the steaming liquid that is simultaneously deep and delicate. She sighs and says, “There's nothing so fine as the taking of toast and tea in the late afternoon or early evening, wouldn't you say?”

“Yeah,” Marco says. “It's pretty great, really.”

She smiles. “Isn't it though? Don't you think so, too, Star?” She gazes at her many times removed grand-daughter through long, violet eyelashes. 

“It is sorta boss,” Star says after swallowing her own mouthful tea. “Why is that, though? Is it, like, to be all fancy or whatever?”

“There is a ceremonial aspect to it,” she says, “an ordering of things, and it is a place to say or not say things that must be said or left unsaid. Also...” She covers her mouth before she giggles. “Also, I just happen to like tea and toast with moonberry jam.”

“Yeah, this moonberry jam is pretty darn scrumptious,” Star says. A little trickle of it runs down the corner of her mouth to her chin. Marco resists the urge to wipe it away with the sleeve of his hoodie.   
Star takes a deep breath before going on. “So, uh... Multiple Greats Grandma Eclipsa... what the heck is going on, here?”

She sips and says, “A lot of things are going on, dear. It would be splendid if you could narrow it down a touch,” before sipping again.

“This thing with Marco and me,” she says. “The other night something happened. I was over at Tom's and there was, uh... a little incident, let's say. Yeah. There was a little incident and I ended up bruised pretty much from head to toe. And Marco ended up the same way.”

“My goodness,” Eclipsa says. “You must have been engaged in a fearful combat. Or whatever it is your children occupy your time with at such hours.” She dropped Marco a heavy lidded wink.

“No,” he says, “it's not like that. She means... she means that I ended up with exactly the same bruises as Star and I was half a kingdom away at the time.”

Eclipsa steeples her fingers and breathes deeply. “Half a kingdom and the same bruises, you say? Most interesting.”

“And the weirdest thing is,” Star says, “when I got upset, like crazy upset and wished he was there with me to help out, these, like, bloody letters appeared on his stomach. It was a message from me—a cry for help. Which is totally metal and all but also kinda gross and creepy.”

Eclipsa sighs. “How touching. Your wishes written literally on his skin like a pillow book made from flesh. You are a lucky girl.” 

Star furrows her brow. “Er, how? You're not gonna get all evil 'Eclipsa Queen of Darkness' on me, here, are you? Cause I just can't even right now.”

“No, no, sweetling,” she says. “No evil. Just... a little jealous, a little wistful, a little sad.” She sips again and nibbles at her toast with red, exquisite bow lips. “The magic of the situation is rather simple. You two have been exposed to a rather powerful mirroring spell.”

“That sounds... ominous,” Marco says.

“It needn't be,” Eclipsa says. “No spell is good or evil, my friend, remember that well, a spell may only be cast with good or evil intentions and have positive or negative consequences—usually both. At any rate... do either of you remember being exposed together to such a spell?”

“I'm coming up dry,” he says. “Star?”

She mumbles something too quiet to hear. When he presses her she whispers at the edge of audibility, “We danced under a Blood Moon.”

Eclipsa's lavender eyes grow wide. “The Blood Moon forges a powerful bond, one that may not be broken. I'm not surprised that your screams etch a message in his blood.”

Star narrows her eyes. “What do you know about the Blood Moon? Did you go to that creepy Lucitor ball, too?”

“Oh heavens no, darling,” she says. “I wouldn't be caught dead in the Underworld—don't be offended but all the skulls and suffering seem dreadfully gauche to me. I did not dance under the Blood Moon but walked under it, instead, with Talon.”

Marco sees that Star's face has turned a trifle green. “Your husband, maybe? That's not a Mewman name...”

“That's because Talon was not a Mewman, dear, nor was he my husband,” Eclipsa says. “Talon was the 'monster' that I fell in love with and left my husband for.”

“So, you, uh, didn't, like, want to?” Star says. “The Blood Moon made you? It can do that?”

“No, my love,” she says, “I wanted to more than I ever have anything else before or since. The Blood Moon spoke in my blood and I could no more resist it than the rhythm of my own heart because it was my heart's own rhythm. The Blood Moon does not coerce, Star, merely shows what must be.”

Star grimaces. “So what must be is Marco all scratched up and bloody?”

Eclipsa's laugh is a tinkling silver bell at midnight. “It may well be if you are distressed and he is away from you, Princess. What must be has many faces, you see, some bright and others dark. All are true and all inevitable.”

Star sighs. “We've got a lot to think about, and talk about, I guess. Thanks, Eclipsa.” She opens her arms to offer the older woman a hug.

Eclipsa hesitates, overcome for a moment by surprise, and then gathers her many times removed great-granddaughter into her arms. “Think nothing of it, dear, and don't let this get you down. Powerful forces move in the cosmos and, from time to time, we can feel like playthings to them. There's always a choice, though, as to what the inevitable might mean.”

Star squints. “I am hopelessly confused.”

Eclipsa shrugs. “I have been for hundreds of years, my love, and I had many of them to do nothing but contemplate these questions.”

They take their leave from the Rose Tower with the feeling of a crimson light bearing down heavy on their shoulders. When Star looks up, though, she sees nothing but the bright blue sky.


	4. Chapter 4

“So...” Star says.

Marco looks into her worried, huge eyes. “Yeah?”

“I dunno. Just 'so,' I guess. I'm kinda at the end of my tether with all this weird stuff, y'know?”

They slump against each other trying to enjoy goblin dogs, nacho fries with vinegar and dripping cones of sweet creamed ice corn. Marco offers what might have passed for a smile on a corpse. “You know it's not gonna get less weird, right? You should know better than that.”

“Yeah,” she says. “Yeah. That's just the life of a fairy princess in a magical kingdom, right? Well you know what, Marco Diaz? It kinda sucks once in a while.”

“Believe me I know.” He twirls a finger in the shimmering golden silk of her hair. “I'm your squire, kid. I've got a front row seat for all the bat shit lunacy you endure on a daily basis. I know why the job doesn't offer a retirement package... I'm not gonna survive to sixteen, let alone fifty-five!” A wink says he's not entirely serious.

“D'aww, it's not that bad,” she says. “I mean, you only got eaten that one time, right? And I got you out of there before you got digested. Mostly.”

“That... that... is such a statistically improbable phrase, you realize that, don't you? I'm gonna be in my high school yearbook as 'Most Likely To Be Digested.'”

“I'll make sure to sign it for you really, really sweet, then, just for that,” she says. 

“Oh? What're you gonna say?”

She makes a yearbook out of one hand and pretends to write in it with the other, “To Marco Diaz, the best squire and best friend a gal could have. Best-besties forever.”

He sighs. “Best-besties under a Blood Moon.”

She winces. “Had to... had to bring that one up, didn't you?” She deflates against him.

“I just don't know what to think about it.” He holds her close to enjoy her warmth more than anything. She's always had the warmest skin of any person he ever knew and the smell of sugar and vanilla in her hair. “What does it mean, actually? Do we have to be, like, together?”

“I dunno,” she says. “Maybe? I mean, that wouldn't be so bad, right?”

“I guess not,” he says. “But wouldn't that suck if that's what we had to tell our grand-kids one day? 'Yeah, Cosmo and Wanda, we got married because a big, freaky red moon told us to.' And what about Tom? Or Kelly? Do they get a vote in any of this?”

“Kelly, huh? I didn't know that was, like, serious.”

He shrugs. “It isn't? I dunno. Maybe. Point is, this is kinda... heavy, right?”

“Totes, totes.”

“So what does it mean, Star?”

“Yeah, when I said I don't know? Meant it, boo.” She nuzzles against his neck. “Could be, might not be, who the corn knows. Maybe together just means in it together, like, for the long haul.”

“All in, right?”  
She giggles. “You and your Gilmore Girls.”

“Hey, now, hey,” he says. “You binge watched it with me, all the way to the bitter, bitter end.”

She shudders. “That end was so, so bitter. So...” She straightens against him. “What are we going to do about this?”

He frowns. “What do you mean?”

“I mean what are we going to do about this? It's one thing to acknowledge that something is going on—hi, I'm Star and I'm a cornaholic—but another one entirely to actually do something about it, to actually change the way you act in response to a situation like this.”

“Well, before you freak out too much,” he says, “I do have kind of an idea.”

“Yeah? I'm all ears. Well, not really cause that would be weird, but... all ears, here, nonetheless.”

“What I suggest,” he says, “is that we don't do anything.”

She scratches her head with the tip of her wand. It seems to Marco not unlike popping the muzzle of a loaded gun into your mouth but, well, she's the expert on wands and not him. “So, uh... I'm liking the energy, here, but I'm not super following where you're leading me, bud...?”

“It's really simple. What are we doing right now?”

“Er, sort of flopping over on each other and moaning about our problems?”

“Yeah, kinda sorta,” he says. “The important thing is that we're taking care of each other. I know that I can always rely on you to help me when I'm in trouble, Star, and you can always rely on me. Even when the going gets really, really rough.”

“Like when I ate that bad sparklecake and you held my hair out of my face while I puked glitter for, like, ten hours straight?”

“Well, we'll go with that, sure,” he says. “Sure. I was thinking more like going into battle with you against Toffee and risking our lives for each other but, yeah, that was pretty grim, too.” He draws a deep breath. “So what I'm saying is that it doesn't matter what we call it, what we call each other. Partners? Milord and milady? BF and slash or GF? Friends? None of that matters as long as we keep on taking care of each other.”

She settles her head on his shoulder again. “Mike and Eleven put it pretty great. A friend is someone that you'd do anything for.”

He smiles. “Yeah.”

“Marco?”

“What?”

“Let's binge watch Stranger Things again.”

He laughs. “That sounds fine by me, Star.”

“Cool beans. And Marco?”

“Yeah?”

“I'm glad you're my friend, whatever that means.”

“Me too, Star. Me too.” They sit in silence for a long time and, eventually, slip into comfortable sleep. A rogue moon's ruddy light shines invisible above and around them. It burns bright against the heart, though, so hot and so bright, enough even to pierce.


End file.
